Graduate Exhibition

'Ritual Therapy' addresses experiences of common anxiety-based behaviours in individuals through the processes of ritualised activity, specifically the craft of whittling. Examining behaviours, such as fidgeting and intrusive thoughts, as possible catalysts of creative practice, the work analyses the compulsions caused by anxiety and how these modify human-object relationships. By applying these perceivably destructive behaviours to creative, repetitive tasks such as whittling, these once reductive actions become constructive mechanisms. Through these actions the individual is given scope for self-reflection, concentration and satisfaction in the achievement of a goal. Through these multi-sensory processes, the individual embeds their own experiences and meanings into the object they have created, which remains for the rest of its lifespan, a memento of past anxieties and reminder of their effective power.